Elie Wiesel's Night is a true account of what the holocaust did, not only to the Jews, but to humanity as well. People all over the world were devastated by this horrendous act, and there are still people today who have not overcome its effects. An example of the horrible acts of the Nazis that stands out occurs at the end of World War II, when Elie and the rest of the inmates at the Buna camp were being force to transfer to the Gleiwitz camp. The transfer was a long, tiring journey through bitter cold and heavy falling snow.
The people were often forced to run during parts of the journey, and if a person was tired or injured he or she are executed. One image of this journey that will forever be in Elie's mind is when Rabbi Eliahou's son left the rabbi for dead so he could survive.The rabbi and his son were running together, but Rabbi Eliahou became tired and had to slow down. As the rabbi slowed down his pace his son continued to run, and pretended not to see that his father was slowing down. This incident forced Elie to think about what he would do in the same situation.
Elie decided that no matter how weak his father became he would always be there for him, even if he would die for it.Throughout the novel Elie Wiesel shows the reader how the Nazis broke the spirits of the Jews. This caused Elie to lose his faith in God, as his time in the Nazi camps grew longer. The reader can see this in Elie's father 's confrontation with the gypsy. His father asked a gypsy where the lavatories were, but the gypsy did not even respond to Elie's father. Then the gypsy struck his father in the head, and knocked him down onto the floor.
Elie watched the situation and realized that he was going to physically and mentally punished during his time at the camp, and his faith in God could not stop it from happening. Elie did nothing to the gypsy that struck his father although the thought did cross his mind. He decided that if he were to fight back at the gypsy the result would be physical harm to him.The incident that probably had the greatest effect on Elie and the other inmates was the hanging of the pipel.
Self-sufficiency was encouraged throughout the concentration camps, therefore Elie was forced to grow up and leave his innocence behind. Because of this self-reliance, many started to view their friends and family as a burden rather than a motivation.
In the 1930s-1940s, the Nazis took millions of Jews into their death camps. They exterminated children, families, and even babies. Elie Wiesel was one of the few who managed to live through the war. However, his life was forever scarred by things he witnessed in these camps. The book Night explained many of the harsh feelings that Elie Wiesel experienced in his time in various German concentration camps.
Due to the cruel punishment Elie endures from the Nazi Army and other prisoners that he comes
When they first arrived at the camp, his father asked their Blockalteste where the toilets were. “Then as if waking from a deep sleep, he slapped my father with such force that he fell down and then crawled back to his place on all fours. I stood petrified. What had happened to me? My father had just been struck in front of me, and I had not even blinked...Only yesterday, I would have dug my nails into this criminal’s flesh.”(Wiesel,39) This shows that Elie would have beaten the guard had he been allowed to. This next quote shows Elie much later, near Buchenwald in a cattle car, cramped and starving. His father’s corpse has just been thrown off the train “And deep inside me, if I could have searched the recesses of my feeble conscience, I might have found something like:Free at last!...”(Wiesel,112) This shows Elie thinking that if he searched inside himself for remorse, he would have found something that said he was free from a
In another example, Elie himself witnessed a furnace in action burning infants as the smoke and fire started to pump into the air. His reaction was rather fearful and unsure if he was going to be next when in line. He knew that what he was seeing was real, and that it was truly brutal. And lastly, the march from Buna to Gleiwitz. This was the winter march in which Elie noticed that Hitler was actually sticking to his word about getting rid of all Jews. He keeps saying “It’s actually happening” over and over again to express his fear, concern, and state of mind. With the situation at the time, it was clear to see how one can be fearful of death and how it can strike at any moment. Then again, some just left for dead. The wrong in this was when Elie noticed that the march caused the Jews to turn against each other as some trampled across one another to move or later on when a kid killed his dad for a couple of bread crumbs. In conclusion, free will and conscience reside in any individual and makes it completely possible for one to judge right from
However, there were warnings by some people that Jewish people were being deported and killed. Although no one believes these warnings, Elie and his family are taken to a ghetto where they have no food. After being in the ghetto, Elie and his father were separated from Elie’s mother and sister because of selection and were placed in cattle cars where they had no room. They are taken to Auschwitz where they suffer from hunger, beatings, and humiliation from the guards which causes Elie’s father to become weak. By now Elie has lost his faith in God because of all he has been through.
..., which made him more upset because it was his own father. Also, he speaks about reaching down into his inner conscious to find out why he really was not as upset and he would have been if it were the first week in the camp. Elie believes that if he reached into his thoughts he would have come up with something like: “Free at last!...”(112).
To start with, before the camps, Elie Wiesel’s father is described as an unsentimental and cultured man. Who never took the time to be with his family and was always too busy for them. Elie describes his father when he said” My father was a cultured man, rather unsentimental. He rarely displayed his feelings, not even within his family, and was more involved with the welfare of others than that of his own kin” (Wiesel 4). Elie Wiesel and his father quickly became reliant on each other for survival in the camps.They became closer together in order to survive the tortures of the camp. Later on, Elie Wiesel’s father is getting beat for not marching right so Elie Wiesel starts teaching his father how to march. Elie Wiesel writes ” Left, right: he punched him. Left, right: he slapped him. I decided to give him lessons in marching in step in keeping time” ( Wiesel 55). Elie Wiesel can’t keep watching his father get beat so he does something to to help him get better at marching. Him and his father start to become closer throughout this moment. In conclusion Elie Wiesel is a victim of inhumanity which allows him to become closer to love
Some of the most fabled stories of our time come from individuals overcoming impossible odds and surviving horrific situations. This is prevalent throughout the Holocaust. People are fascinated with this event in history because the survivors had to overcome immense odds. One, of many, of the more famous stories about the Holocaust is Night by Elie Wiesel. Through this medium, Wiesel still manages to capture the horrors of the camps, despite the reader already knowing the story.
Elie, who was a teenager at the time of the novel, stood by his father’s side and assisted his father through physical challenges they had to face. Wiesel writes “I decided to give my father lessons in marching in step, in keeping time” (page 55). This shows that Elie is helping his father avoid the “selection” by giving him marching lessons to help him survive the death march. Elie stayed by his father’s side even in the harshest conditions. Elie writes “my father’s presence was the only thing that stopped me. He was running next to me out of breath, out of strength, desperate. I had no right to let myself die. What would he do without me? I was his sole support” (page 86-87). This shows that Elie remained loyal to his father by staying with him no matter what. In conclusion Elie is considered a hero because of the familial commitment choice to stand by his
During their journey, Elie loses his father due to illness however does not feel much emotion. After witnessing his own die, Elie “did not weep” and “deep inside me, if I could have searched the recesses of my feeble conscience, I might have found something like: Free at last!...” (Wiesel 112). While going through the camp Buna, Elie and his father had develops a strong relationship with one another. However, after his father’s death, Elie “did not weep” and displays very little towards the event. Elie had felt that his father was a liability for his own survival and did not feel the need to weep over his death. Elie also states that he was “Free at last” showing that throughout the course of the novel Elie had thought as his father as pulling him back from survival. The reason for Elie feels this way is because Elie is still on his journey and his primary goal is to survive through the camps. Elie has become quite desperate through his journey of survival and searches the “recesses of my feeble conscience” for his most inner thoughts. Throughout the novel, Elie had been storing these thoughts in the back of mind. These thoughts include him thinking of his father as liability and him being free from him. At their first arrival at the camps, Elie and his father had been very close to one another going through their journey of survival. However, after
His father is getting old, and weak, and Elie realizes his father does not have the strength to survive on his own, and it is too late to save him. "It's too late to save your old father, I said to myself..."(pg 105). He felt guilty because he could not help his father, but he knew the only way to live is to watch out for himself. "Here, every man has to fight for himself and not think of anyone else. Even of his father..."(pg 105). He thinks of himself, and
When his father was beat up by the guard or even he was getting beat up by the Kapo. Elie could only think of himself, which is a good thing not wanting to get hurt for others in my opinion. Also, when Rabbi’s son ran away from him I would guess Elie would think of the same thing but instead wanted to protect his father. Then last when Elie’s father was about to die his last words was, “Elizer” which was Elies name. Elie was finally think that his duty is over on protecting his father. Also, Elie also thought, “free at last” which meant his can fend for him. So, his relationship with his father wasn’t good. Cause Elie thought the reason he is alive because of his father. That is why his relationship with his father wasn’t a good
Elie Wiesel writes about his personal experience of the Holocaust in his memoir, Night. He is a Jewish man who is sent to a concentration camp, controlled by an infamous dictator, Hitler. Elie is stripped away everything that belongs to him. All that he has worked for in his life is taken away from him instantly. He is even separated from his mother and sister. On the other side of this he is fortunate to survive and tell his story. He describes the immense cruel treatment that he receives from the Nazis. Even after all of the brutal treatment and atrocities he experiences he does not hate the world and everything in it, along with not becoming a brute.
Elie is more concerned about his own safety but does everything g to help his father with out endangering himself. In the book Night, he was telling about when the SS guard were trying to throw his father out of the carriage and Elie says" I set to work slapping him as hard as I could.